Solar monitoring services recorded three extreme flares late yesterday evening and overnight. The strongest eruption occurred on February 22 at 1:32 AM ET and reached an index of X6.3. A previous strong flare of magnitude X8.2 was observed in 2017, during the previous cycle of solar activity. Increases in the frequency and intensity of outbreaks during the new cycle indicate that activity is approaching its peak and may occur sooner than anticipated.

Two of the three explosions were not accompanied by coronal mass ejections, charged particles of matter in the Sun’s corona. There is no information yet regarding the third and most intense incident. The group of points releasing the flares is moving towards the center of the Sun, and the coronal mass ejection will certainly be directed towards our planet. Although satellites are affected, they do not pose a direct threat to life on Earth. Also, a flash in the form of ionizing radiation can temporarily interrupt shortwave communications on the illuminated part of the Earth and cause an overload of the automation of electrical networks.

The Sun’s activity cycle repeats every 11 years. One cycle can be very different from another, so scientists carefully observe the processes on our star and create new diagrams of the cycle each time. The Sun is currently on track to reach its zenith in the 25th cycle since the beginning of observations of this process. The previous 24th cycle was “quiet”, but as observations of recent years have shown, extremely high activity should be expected from the new cycle.

Data from previous observations allowed us to expect to see the peak of the Sun’s activity in the first half of 2025. New observational data indicate that the peak will most likely occur in the second half of 2024. He’s somewhere nearby. And it’s a good thing for us that this only results in the growing northern lights and nothing else, like the mass fall of Starlink satellites to Earth or failures in the power grids.